Haunted
by SkywardShadow
Summary: *Modern-day AU; Spoilers* When Mizuki let Hifumi drag her into spending the night at a supposedly "haunted" teahouse, she didn't know what she was in for.


Disclaimer: I do not own Nightmare Inspector or any of the characters therein.

**A/N: Moshi moshi! So apparently to have more than one page in a fanfiction archive, we need more than 25 stories. -.-; Think we can hit it? Oh, and the 'small fire' is referring to that incident with Hifumi and the Formalin.**

**Haunted**

**.'.**

"I don't think this is a good idea, Hifumi."

"Aw come on, Mizuki! This is the most haunted residence for a hundred miles!"

"It's the _only_ haunted residence for a hundred miles," Mizuki pointed out.

Hifumi waved her statement off. "We're the only ones brave enough to go in there. We're the only ones who can find out the truth!" he declared passionately. Then he added as an afterthought, "We'll also get famous if we happen to catch something really good."

Mizuki sighed, wondering what had possessed her to go along with this.

**.'.**

Mizuki came from a working-class family. They owned and lived in a coffee shop slash occult store, the latter of which was an eternal source of confusion to Mizuki. Her elder brother had liked the occult, maybe that was it..but she didn't like to think about her brother. Azusa had vanished without a trace a few years ago, and the only way to keep herself from getting depressed over it was to avoid thinking about him if at all possible.

Hifumi was a member of an insanely rich family. He was homeschooled, and having no part-time jobs to contend with he was constantly hunting for new and exciting hobbies to indulge himself in. The latest one was ghost-hunting. He'd found his way to Mizuki's family's shop one day, discovered all the novelties dealing with the paranormal, and the rest was history.

Hifumi kept coming back to the shop after that, and over time he and Mizuki formed a friendship (he happened to have a crush on her as well, which she pointedly ignored). One day he'd asked if she wanted to go on an overnight ghost hunting excursion with him, and having nothing better to do she'd agreed.

_Stupid,_ Mizuki lamented. _I should have stayed home._

The location her friend was so excited about was none other than the Silver Star Teahouse, which was supposedly the most (as well as only) haunted place in the area. It had been popular during the 1900's, but at some point had closed down or been abandoned. It was now boarded up but otherwise untouched, as it was a "historical landmark."

_If that's the case, then why don't they let people in?_ Mizuki wondered.

But that wasn't her priority right now. Her current issue was..

"There's no way in."

Hifumi grinned a grin that she had learned to interpret as a sign of trouble. It was a grin that said, _Ah, little Mizuki, you're so naïve! We just need to [insert ridiculous scheme here] and everything'll work out perfectly!_

"Please tell me you aren't thinking what I think you're thinking," she said plaintively.

"What do you think I'm thinking?" Hifumi inquired, raising an eyebrow.

"…" Actually, she had no idea what he was thinking. She just knew it couldn't be anything good. "You'll get us both grounded," she muttered warningly.

Hifumi had already turned his attention back to the dark little building before them. "There's no other option," he decided. "We'll have to break in."

Mizuki blinked a few times. _He's joking. Even Hifumi would never do anything that stupid._ A quick glance at his face told her otherwise. _Oh, my…He's serious._

"Are you insane?" she choked out. "Forget grounded; we'll be arrested!"

"Not if we don't get caught," Hifumi replied brightly, heading for the teahouse.

Mizuki scurried after him, glancing around fearfully. "It's dark, but barely," she protested. "We'll be seen, or heard."

"We can keep from being seen, and we can blame any noise on the ghost that lives here!" Hifumi assured her, heading around to the back of the house.

"Hifumi, that doesn't-wait, where are we going?"

"Back door," he explained. "It'll make the damage impossible to see, unless someone comes around."

Mizuki almost fainted when he said 'damage'.

As Hifumi had expected, there was a back door, also boarded up. Hifumi walked right up to it, grabbed one of the wooden boards, and started yanking. The old wood groaned under his fingertips, making Mizuki wince.

"Hifumi, be caref-"

Too late. Under the pressure of another hard yank the board came loose with a loud crack, sending the yanker flying backwards.

Hifumi picked himself up and beamed while Mizuki stood by in shock. "This is great!" he exclaimed happily. "We'll be inside in no time!"

**.'.**

Unfortunately for Mizuki, he was right. The rest of the boards broke just as easily as the first, and in what seemed like no time at all they were making their way down a dark and dusty hallway.

Trying to put aside her nervousness at their inevitable arrest, Mizuki brushed cobwebs away from her face as they entered the main room of the teahouse. It wasn't really anything special; there was a counter for the host or hostess to stand behind, and some tables with chairs arranged underneath the now painted-over windows. Nothing had managed to escape the thick layer of dust that had settled in the room, and every piece of furniture showed signs of old age and neglect.

"This is fantastic," Hifumi breathed. "It's the perfect place for a haunting! Let's go upstairs!"

Mizuki bit her lip. She wasn't overly fond of the idea of being inside a bunch of dead people's bedrooms, but on the other hand she definitely didn't want to be left in this eerie room by herself. She ended up following her friend as he bounded enthusiastically up the stairs.

The second floor was mainly comprised of another hallway, lined by doors that led to several bedrooms. Anything that might have given them some clue about the owners had been taken when the teahouse closed down, although one of the rooms looked like it had suffered through a small fire at some point. One of the doors they couldn't open. It had been locked tightly and Mizuki refused to let Hifumi break into it. It was just as well; something about the door made her feel slightly creeped out.

They headed back downstairs. Hifumi draped himself casually over one of the old wooden chairs. Mizuki lowered herself onto one cautiously, relaxing a bit when it didn't immediately crumble underneath her.

"What now?" she asked, checking her watch. It was almost nine.

"We wait," Hifumi responded simply. "Wait for the trapped spirit to show itself!"

And so they did. After about twenty minutes of silence, however, they both started to get restless.

_It's going to be a long night,_ Mizuki thought with a sigh.

"I know!" Hifumi said, snapping his fingers. "We can tell stories about the house and the ghost! Maybe hearing his past will coax the ghost out!"

Mizuki nodded. "Do you know anything about the history of this place, then?"

"Yeah, I looked up everything I could this morning." Hifumi settled into his chair and started telling the story.

"At around the end of the Taisho era, the Silver Star Teahouse was pretty well known around here. The hostess was really young, but she ran the place all by herself. People came for her coffee, which from what I hear was really something special, but at some point the coffee became just a sideshow for the main attraction."

"Which was what?" Mizuki asked interestedly.

Hifumi leaned forward, obviously enjoying telling the story. "A baku," he said. "According to local legend, a baku took up residence here."

Mizuki couldn't help it. She started laughing.

"Hey!" Hifumi exclaimed, indignant at the interruption.

"I'm sorry," she apologized. "I'm sorry. It's just..a dream eater? The baku from Chinese mythology? I find it hard to believe."

"So you'll believe in ghosts but not baku?"

_I never said I believed in ghosts either,_ Mizuki replied silently.

"Anyway." Hifumi cleared his throat and resumed the tale. "The baku hung around, and people started coming to see him and ask him to get rid of their nightmares. It did wonders for the Silver Star's business, even though _those_ customers only came at night. But something really weird happened after a while."

Mizuki gave her obligatory "What?"

"The baku disappeared without a trace. No warning, no anything; just one day here and the next day gone."

Mizuki swallowed hard. _Gone without a trace. Like Azusa._

"But that wasn't the weirdest part," Hifumi continued. "What was really strange was that the baku was almost immediately replaced by a _second_ baku! Most people who came to the Silver Star looking for nightmare help didn't come back again-I dunno why-so news that the old baku had been replaced didn't really get around. But the new guy took up his predecessor's job helping people with their nightmares."

"And what did he get in return?" Mizuki inquired.

"He got to eat the nightmares," Hifumi said nonchalantly. He grinned at Mizuki's horrified look. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I don't know what he got back. So time went on; the hostess took in a lodger to supplement their budget, but other than that things went on as normal. Then one last thing happened, one last strange thing." He didn't even wait for her "What" this time. "The baku disappeared, and he too was replaced-except that he was replaced by the _old_ baku, who he'd replaced first!"

Mizuki frowned, trying to wrap her mind around it. "So Baku One vanishes and is replaced by Baku Two, then Baku Two vanishes and is replaced by Baku One?" She actually felt her head spinning. Hifumi nodded. "Then..what happened afterwards?"

"I don't know," her friend replied glumly. "After that, the info stops. I guess business kept up; that's all I could find on what happened after the second baku switch."

"They couldn't have done all that well," Mizuki observed. "The place closed down in the 1950's, didn't it?"

"Yeah. I wish I knew what happened. Maybe the hostess died or something."

"Maybe." Mizuki tipped her head back and looked at the rotting ceiling. "Or maybe she just got tired."

**.'.**

Another look at her watch revealed that the time was now eleven thirty. _About six and a half hours before daylight,_ Mizuki calculated with a quiet groan. She looked over to see how Hifumi was holding up after hours of hopeful silence.

He was asleep.

Mizuki scowled. He dragged her into illegally spending the night in a scary old house so he could find his ghosts, and then he fell asleep. She almost strode over and upended the chair he was slumbering on, but suddenly a revelation hit her.

_If he's asleep..that means I can get some sleep too!_ Berating herself for not thinking of it earlier, Mizuki squirmed a bit to make herself comfortable on her chair and closed her eyes.

**.'.**

_Mizuki._

The girl shot straight up. Hadn't it only been two minutes ago that she started sleeping? Why did Hifumi have to wake up so fast?

Pulling her mini flashlight from her pocket, she aimed it at her friend to see what he wanted.

He was still asleep.

Frowning, Mizuki aimed the flashlight elsewhere. There was nobody in sight. Of course there wasn't-she was inside of a boarded-up old house hailed as haunted, never mind the fact that it was-a check of the watch-three AM.

Then why did she feel like there was another presence in the room with her?

Shaking her head, Mizuki turned off the light and chalked it up to an already-forgotten dream and the overall creepiness of the place in which she was currently residing. The windows, painted over black, made the big main room of the teahouse dreary enough in the daytime; now that they were in the twilight hours the darkness was all the more total.

_Mizuki._

Mizuki stood, fumbling for the mini flashlight. _I heard something,_ she thought, trembling. _There was definitely something there. That was no dream. Something said my name._

She felt her heart beating hard against her chest as she finally managed to free the light, but she was shaking so badly that it immediately flew from her hands and hit the floor, where it rolled off into a corner. She couldn't find it now, in this darkness; she'd have a better chance of locating a blond hair in a haystack.

Which meant that she now had no way of seeing if something decided to come at her.

"Hifumi," she managed to croak. "Hifu-!"

_Something just moved._

She had sensed it if not seen it; the subtle shift of shadow somewhere in the room. An indicator that she and Hifumi were not alone.

"W-Who's there?" she forced herself to ask.

Something shifted again. Mizuki whipped around and found herself face to face with the intruder.

Her voice froze; her throat refused to cooperate with her brain's wishes and scream.

_Hello, Mizuki_, the-ghost?-said. Its voice seemed to echo in her head rather than her ears.

Mizuki, for her part, was shocked into stillness. She was looking at a boy, maybe sixteen or so. He had oddly spiked pale hair and glimmering grey-blue eyes underlined by dark circles. His skin was paler than could possibly be healthy, and he was dressed in what could kindly be described as rags. He appeared listless, but focused on her intently.

"Who-who-?" Mizuki couldn't get the words out.

"You know who I am, don't you?" Now it sounded like he was speaking normally.

_Why would I know who he is?_ "I-I'm sorry," she stammered. "I don't. I've never seen you before." She swallowed. "Are..Are you the ghost everyone says haunts this place?"

He ignored the query and put forth one of his own. "What is the year?"

She told him.

"Ah. You wouldn't know, then. I suppose I forgot. You look so much like her…" His hand twitched, as though he wanted to reach out but had thought better of it.

Perplexed and still somewhat dazed, Mizuki managed to ask another question. "What is your name?"

His expression changed, though in the nonexistent light she couldn't tell how. "Hiruko."

"I'm Mizuki," she offered.

At this the boy looked up and stared her in the eye. She bit her lip; his-Hiruko's-frank gaze unnerved her.

"Did you live here?" she blurted.

"Yes," he replied.

"Did you like it here?" At this point she no longer had any idea where the questions were coming from; they were just coming.

"Yes," he repeated quietly.

Mizuki remembered something Hifumi had mentioned during his earlier monologue. "Were you the lodger who lived upstairs?"

Hiruko shook his head. "I lived here, but I wasn't a lodger."

"Then-?"

"I was a baku."

A tremor ran through her body at those words, and she squinted to see if he was lying or kidding. His face was calm and completely serious.

"A…?"

"A dream eater. A nightmare inspector." A grim smirk. "For a while, at least."

Mizuki forced herself not to start trembling all over again. "Were you Baku One or Baku Two?" she asked, feeling distinctly lightheaded.

"Baku-? Oh. I suppose I was Baku Two." There was a trace of bitterness in his tone that time.

"What happened? Hifumi said you disappeared."

"..Hifumi?" Hiruko glanced at her companion and smirked just a little before his face resumed its expressionless state. "I did disappear. At some point I found myself back here, but.." He smiled grimly. "By that time it was empty."

Mizuki forgot her fear for a moment and felt a pang of sympathy for the young ghost. Despite his apparent apathy, it seemed that underneath he had cared for this place..or maybe someone in it?

"Did you know the hostess?" Mizuki questioned excitedly, feeling vaguely bad for interrogating him about his old life but unable to stop herself. "Was she the one you said I looked like?"

"Perceptive," Hiruko noted dryly. "I knew her. The two of you do share a resemblance."

"Did you.." Mizuki bit her tongue nervously. The question she now wanted to ask seemed terribly rude, but on the other hand she might not ever get this chance again. She wanted to gather as much information as she could _while_ she could. "Did you love her?" she blurted, blushing red. _This is just surreal. I'm having a conversation about love with a ghost._

Aforementioned ghost chuckled before answering. "You're nosy," he said, causing her to go even redder. "But I'll answer you. I did love her, but…probably not in the way you're thinking."

"What do you-"

"I know why I appeared here after.." Hiruko interrupted her and then trailed off, picking up after whatever he'd been about to say. "…but I couldn't figure out why I was stuck here."

"Stuck?" Mizuki asked. "Why do you say that so negatively? I thought you said you liked it here."

Hiruko eyed her for what felt like a long time before speaking again. "I did like it here. It was..it was home for me, the first place I felt attached to. But look around." He gestured to the sad, empty room. "There's no one here anymore. There shouldn't be anything keeping me here." He smiled ruefully. "I suppose there was something, though."

He stood slowly and walked toward her. Mizuki felt her eyes widen with renewed fear. _Is he going to possess me_? She knew it was ridiculous, but still.. He was right in front of her, extending a white hand. She flinched and closed her eyes.

A hand rested itself softly on her head. It felt comforting, oddly, and also familiar..although Mizuki couldn't for the life of her figure out why.

"I guess I just wanted to see her one more time," she heard the ghost murmur, almost wistfully.

Then the slight pressure on her head was gone, and when she opened her eyes, so was Hiruko.

"Oh..." The wetness on her face was sudden and unexpected. She felt inexplicably sad, but also relieved. Because the Silver Star ghost, she knew, was now where he needed to be. Wherever that was.

**.'.**

"Mizuki!"

Once again, Mizuki was jolted from sleep as someone called her name. Only this time the voice was easily recognizable.

"Mizuki, you awake?"

"Yes, Hifumi," she mumbled. "Unfortunately."

"Great. C'mon and get up; we gotta get out of here."

"What?" _Now_ she felt more awake. "Why?"

Hifumi had the grace to look sheepish. "This morning I went outside to, er, relieve myself, and go figure, this old lady happens to be out looking for her cat, and she sees me and..um..calls the police. I mean what are the odds, right?"

Mizuki closed her eyes and summoned all of her available patience which, as she had been up half the night, wasn't very much. She dragged herself off of the chair, finding her own lack of panic rather strange.

"This sucks though," Hifumi sighed as they ran out the door. "All this trouble and we didn't even see anything last night!"

Mizuki's eyes widened as the night's adventure came back to her. "Mm, about that-"

_Meow._

"Ack!" Hifumi yelped as he almost tripped over a small animal. "I'm walking here!"

Mizuki crouched down and found herself looking at a small black cat with enormous, inquisitive eyes.

"Mizuki, we've gotta keep moving!"

"I know, I know." Reluctantly, she stood and resumed running. After a few strides she took one look back at the little cat.

It was gone. Nowhere in sight.

"Oh," she squeaked. Maybe Hiruko hadn't been the only one haunting the Silver Star.

**.'.**

A few weeks had passed since the overnight excursion at the Silver Star Teahouse, and to Mizuki's astonishment neither she nor Hifumi had been arrested. Their parents hadn't even caught on.

The episode with Hiruko had robbed her of sleep for a few nights, but at some point she had decided that the eerie teahouse and her own exhaustion had resulted in a very bizarre, realistic dream. The cat, she figured, had simply run off as soon as she's turned her back. And so ghosts were the last thing on her mind on this sunny Saturday.

As she sat peacefully, reading a book, the door to the coffee shop opened with a bang and Hifumi came flying in.

"Hello, Hifumi," Mizuki greeted him, not even batting an eye at his exuberant entrance.

"Hey," Hifumi panted. "I had to show this to you. Remember how I told you I'd been doing research on the Silver Star? Well, part of that was using a few of my dad's connections to see if there was anything relating to the teahouse in antique stores or stuff like that. The guys are all over Japan, but none of them got back to me with news. Except one."

Grinning, Hifumi pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and unfolded it. "He sent me a photocopy of something he'd found in this tiny little antique shop. It's dated about 1926."

Mizuki took the offered paper and gave it a long look. A long shiver ran down her spine.

The copy was of an old photograph in a silver frame. There were three people in it.

One was a cheerful-looking guy in a suit, grinning at the camera like he was all too happy to be there. His disturbing resemblance to Hifumi didn't go unnoticed by Mizuki, but that wasn't what shocked her.

The second person was a teenage girl in a long dress. Her hands were in her lap and she looked a little nervous, but was still smiling. She could have been Mizuki's twin, but even that wasn't what unnerved Mizuki the most.

Moreover, it was the third person in the photo. A young man looking extremely uncomfortable; he was looking pointedly away from the camera and appeared desperate to be anywhere else. His hair was spiky though moderately tamed for the picture, his skin was milky white, and those eyes..by now, she probably could have recognized them anywhere.

_Hiruko._

"So what do you think?" Hifumi was asking. "Don't those two look scarily like us?! I don't know who the other guy is, but that's not important-hey-Mizuki? Mizuki, are you alright?!"

She had fainted.

**.'Owari'.**

**A/N: Fuuun. So much fun. Maybe the ending was a little abrupt, but..hm. Hope you liked!**


End file.
